Zebra Crab & Emperor Shrimp

[ed4]

Hey gang,

Is anyone familar with the upkeep of any of these?

Zebra Crab

Emperor Shrimp

From what I've read in the past, and I can be mistaken, the zebra crab needs a commensial urchin to live upon and the emperor shrimp also needs a nudibranch as well.

I was wondering if these can be added to a reef & sustained long-term. Lastly, any caveats with keeping either? Dangers to others organisms, special care, etc?

Thanks again in advance!

 

[mhills16]

well i cant give you the answers but i just wanted to say those are some good looking inverts! cannot wait to find out the info because i want them now lol !

 

[ed4]

Yeah same here - I'm going to be putting together an order with Atlantis for some frags and I might throw these guys in too.

Here's their page:

http://www.atlantisaquarium.net/inverts.html

 

[Tennyson]

hey, i was just googling images of zebra crabs since that pic wasn't very good. and found this mini-site of pics of them. they're really nice. and i love that shrimp in the pic on this site.

http://images.google.com/imgres?img...+crab&um=1&hl=en&client=safari&rls=en-us&sa=N

 

[ed4]

Geez, those pics in that site make me want a zebra crab even more.

I wonder if these can be reliably sustained w/o an urchin, just like porcelein crabs.

 

[friedoysterskin]

liveaquara had those in their diver den, they didnt much but they did mention that they weren't reef safe.

 

[finsurgeon]

The zebra crab lives full-time on an urchin. I had one for about 1.5 years and another for about 6 months. It seems to eat urchin spines as its only food, so it takes a large or very hearty urchin to sustain it, or a couple of urchins. I'd say it prefers astropyga radiata (radiant urchin) best, but that a black diadema (long-spine) worked very well. For me, the crab seemed to keep a pair of diadema urchins at a reasonable size to stay in my tank, but a single urchin just got too chewed up. And short spine urchins (blue tux, purple "rainbow", or purple "rock boring" were only rarely found with the crab on it, or only for a short stay before going back to the long-spine. I'd say there is no way to support the crab without at least 2 urchins it likes.

 

[finsurgeon]

The zebra crab is perfectly reef safe. The emperor shrimp rides along on a large cucumber, but pops off to wander a bit for close-by food. I'd say my fish got the shrimp on one of his wanderings. They're pretty small, and any fish with tendencies to grab a small shrimp would have a hard time resisting them.

 

[ed4]

Thanks, I think I'll pass on the zerba crab.

How small is small on the emperor shrimp?